Prosecuting Political Aspiration

EU-Indonesia Human Rights Dialogue Should Take up Cases of Imprisoned Activists

Maps of Prisons with Political Prisoners in Indonesia

Summary

The judges should have deemed his action more as a
political aspiration than a life-threatening act.... He only waved an RMS flag,
and did not carry a weapon.

—Asmara Nababan, former secretary-general of the
National Commission on Human Rights in Jakarta, speaking about the prosecution
of Johan Teterisa.

Indonesia has made important progress in strengthening
democracy and respect for human rights since the end of authoritarian rule
under President Suharto in 1998. Advances have included permitting increased
freedom of association and assembly, holding three generally free and fair
national elections, and providing greater overall protection for civil and
political rights.

Improved freedom of expression has been hailed as emblematic
of this progress. While there have been notable accomplishments—700 new
magazines and newspapers sprung up in the first three years after
Suharto’s ouster alone—the right to free speech in Indonesia
continues to be limited in three significant ways:

Laws criminalizing defamation and insult remain in the
criminal code and are used to silence anti-corruption activists, human
rights defenders, journalists, consumers, and others.[1]

The government continues to criminally prosecute people
who express religious beliefs that deviate from the central tenets of six
officially recognized religions; heterodoxy and public adherence to
unrecognized religions are officially illegal.[2]

The government continues to criminally prosecute peaceful
expression of pro-independence sentiment by ethnic minority activists in
Papua and the southern Moluccan islands.

This report focuses on this last area. It profiles the cases
of 10 prominent Papuan and Moluccan activists currently behind bars for
expressing their political views, detailing ill-treatment they have suffered
and violations of their due process rights. In total there are currently at least
100 Papuans and Moluccans in prison in Indonesia for peaceful political
expression.

Human Rights Watch takes no position on claims to
self-determination in Indonesia or in any other country, and nothing in this
report should be construed as supporting or denigrating the independence
aspirations of Papuan or Moluccan activists. Consistent with international law,
however, we support the right of all individuals, including independence
supporters, to express their political views peacefully without fear of arrest
or other forms of reprisal.

President Suharto was notorious for arresting and
imprisoning those who opposed him, from Communist party members and
sympathizers in the early years to critics of all stripes, including ethnic
minority pro-independence advocates, in his later years. Under Suharto,
Indonesian authorities failed to distinguish between acts of criminal violence
and peaceful expression of separatist views, contributing to political
polarization and fueling radicalization in East Timor and Aceh. While those
latter conflicts have been resolved through political agreements and thousands
of political prisoners have been released since Suharto’s resignation,
the practice of lumping together peaceful advocates and armed militants and
treating both as criminals continues in Papua and the southern Moluccas.

Most of the cases detailed in this report are of activists
imprisoned for organizing rallies or participating in ceremonies in which flags
were raised symbolizing aspirations for an independent state in Papua or in the
southern Moluccan islands. In December 2007, the Indonesian government issued
Government Regulation 77/2007, which regulates regional symbols. Article 6 of
the regulation bans display of flags or logos that have the same features as “organizations,
groups, institutions or separatist movements.” Both the Papuan Morning
Star flag and the “Benang Raja” (rainbow) flag of the Republic of
the South Moluccas (Republik Maluku Selatan, RMS) are considered to fall under
this ban.[3]

Most of the political prisoners in Indonesia were convicted
of makar (rebellion or treason) under articles 106 and 110 of the
Indonesian Criminal Code. Many were sentenced to 10 years or more in prison. In
several cases the activists were tortured by police while in pre-trial
detention. Some have faced mistreatment and denial of medical treatment while
in prison.

Moluccan activist Reimond Tuapattinaya, first detained in
June 2007, described being tortured immediately following his arrest:

If they held an iron bar, we got the iron bar. If they held
a wooden bat, we got the wooden bat. If they held a wire cable, we got cabled.
Shoes. Bare hands. They used everything. The torture was conducted inside
Tantui and the Moluccan police headquarters. I was tortured for 14 days in
Tantui, day and night. They picked me up in the morning, and returned me,
bleeding, to my cell in the evening.

The cases profiled here also illuminate a larger problem:
according to activists, media reports, and statements by some officials, more
than 100 pro-independence activists from these two regions are currently
imprisoned for peaceful expression. We are not able to confirm the exact number
of prisoners held solely for peaceful expression of their views because in many
cases, court documents detailing the basis for imprisonment are not publicly
available. But the cases here demonstrate that authorities continue to arrest
and prosecute pro-independence activists for non-violent actions such as
raising flags and organizing rallies and that these actions reflect current
government practice.

* * *

Freedom of expression is protected in Indonesia’s
constitution and international human rights law. The constitution in article
28(e) states, “Every person shall have the right to the freedom of
association and expression of opinion.” Article 28(f) provides,
“Every person shall have the right to communicate and obtain information
for the development of his/her personal life and his/her social environment,
and shall have the right to seek, acquire, possess, keep, process, and convey
information by using all available channels.”

The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
(ICCPR), which Indonesia ratified in 2006, also protects the right to free
expression. Under article 19, “[e]veryone shall have the right to freedom
of expression; this right shall include freedom to seek, receive and impart
information and ideas of all kinds, regardless of frontiers, either orally, in
writing or in print, in the form of art, or through any other media of his choice.”[4]

Secession movements can pose legitimate national security
concerns, and in limited circumstances, justify restrictions on the free speech
rights enumerated immediately above. Article 19 of the ICCPR states that these
rights are “subject to certain restrictions, but these shall only be such
as are provided by law and are necessary: … For the protection of
national security or of public order (ordre public), or of public health or
morals.”[5]

Whether any particular expression of ethnic nationalism or
support for secession poses a national security risk will depend on the
circumstances prevailing at the time.

The 1995 Johannesburg Principles on National Security,
Freedom of Expression, and Access to Information elaborates widely accepted
standards on national security restrictions:

Principle 5: No one may be subjected to any sort of
restraint, disadvantage or sanction because of his or her opinions or beliefs.

Principle 6: [Apart from legitimate state secrets,]
expression may be punished as a threat to national security only if a
government can demonstrate that: (a) the expression is intended to incite
imminent violence; (b) it is likely to incite such violence; and (c) there is a
direct and immediate connection between the expression and the likelihood or
occurrence of such violence.[6]

In the cases detailed in this report, the government did not
demonstrate the threat of imminent violence or the presence of a nexus between
speech and violence.

Recommendations

Human Rights Watch urges the Indonesian government to
immediately and unconditionally release all persons whose cases are detailed in
this report, and all other prisoners held for peaceful expression of their
political views. To the extent that any such individuals are also alleged to
have engaged in acts of violence or illegal trespass, they should be given a
new trial in accordance with international standards and credited with time
served.

We also urge that the government amend or repeal all
articles of the Indonesian Criminal Code that have been used to imprison
individuals for their legitimate peaceful activities, including articles 106
and 110 of the Criminal Code on “rebellion,” to bring Indonesian
criminal law into conformity with international standards. As currently
written, the law allows for prosecution of those engaged in peaceful advocacy
of independence.

The reformed legal framework Indonesia adopts for
pro-independence expression should be consistent with the Johannesburg
Principles and be accompanied by an explicit public commitment not to prosecute
individuals merely for raising the Morning Star or RMS flags. The law should
make a clear distinction between display of pro-independence symbols in private
homes and property, which should not be subject to government interference, and
display in government offices and property, which the authorities have the
discretion to regulate.

The Indonesian government should revoke article 6 of
Government Regulation No. 77/2007, which prohibits the display of separatist
logos or flags, or bring it into compliance with international human rights
standards and the Indonesian constitution.

Authorities should promptly respond to credible reports of
torture in custody by conducting thorough and impartial investigations and hold
legally accountable all those responsible, and revise rules and practices at
jails and prisons to ensure compliance by all security forces with the
Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or
Punishment, and the United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of
Prisoners.

Finally, we urge that the Indonesian government remove
arbitrary restrictions on access to all regions of Papua by journalists and
humanitarian and human rights workers.

Concerned governments and inter-governmental bodies also
have an important role to play. We urge other governments to push for amendment
or repeal of Indonesian laws that allow for imprisonment of individuals for
peaceful political expression. Foreign embassy personnel should visit and
monitor the situation of political prisoners held at facilities in Semarang, Malang,
Porong, Kediri, Nusa Kambangan (Pasir Putih and Kembang Kuning), Ambon, and
various locales in Papua such as Abepura, Sentani, Biak, Nabire, Fakfak,
Wamena, and Merauke.

The United States and Australian governments should also
cease any training for the Detachment 88/Anti-Terror unit implicated in the
torture of RMS prisoners after the June 29, 2007 protest in Ambon and press the
Indonesian government to investigate and to bring to justice officers
responsible for torture.

Methodology

Human Rights Watch collected data about the political
prisoners profiled in this report from December 2008 to May 2010, visiting
prisons in Papua, the Moluccan islands, and Java. All the interviews except one
were conducted by various means by a Human Rights Watch researcher, and in a
significant number of cases, the researcher interviewed the prisoner multiple
times. Altogether Human Rights Watch directly and indirectly interviewed more
than 50 political prisoners in the Moluccas, Papua, and Java. In order to
protect against possible retaliation against persons who facilitated the
interviews, the actual dates of the interviews have been withheld.

In selecting the cases for this report, we focused on
individuals imprisoned for peaceful acts of political expression who do not
advocate the use of violence to achieve political or other objectives.

The only case included in this report of someone accused of
committing violence is that of Ferdinand Pakage, a political prisoner in
Abepura, Papua, who was sentenced to 15 years in prison for the stabbing death
of a policeman during riots. Circumstances in his case—he was allegedly
tortured to give a confession during the police investigation and there were
serious irregularities in his trial—raise concerns about the fairness of
his conviction.

Political Prisoners from the Moluccas

Background

A pro-independence movement has existed in the southern Moluccas, centered on the island of Ambon, since 1950, the year after Indonesia gained its independence. Many of the indigenous people of this region call
themselves Alifurus. On April 25, 1950, Alifuru nationalists in the All
Southern Moluccas Council, led by Chr. R.S. Soumokil, held a national
conference on Ambon Island and proclaimed the creation of the independent
Republic of the South Moluccas (Republik Maluku Selatan, RMS). President
Sukarno’s decision later that year to disband the federal Republic of the
United States of Indonesia in favor of a more centralized Republic of Indonesia
gave further impetus to Moluccan separatism.

In response to the RMS proclamation, the Indonesian
government sent troops to Ambon, conducting military operations that largely
dispersed the rebellion by November 1950 but which continued until the final
defeat of the RMS in 1966. Many of the surviving RMS leaders fled into exile in
the Netherlands where they formed a government-in-exile that continues to this
day.

While the RMS does not today enjoy broad support in the Moluccas, nationalist sentiments have continued in pockets in the region. Issues of
independence and sovereignty were inflamed by religion-based communal conflicts
between the predominantly Christian Alifurus and Muslim migrants from Java and Sulawesi (migration that for many years was encouraged by the Indonesian government).
Sectarian violence erupted in January 1999 in Ambon and later spread throughout
the archipelago, continuing through 2005. Thousands of people were killed and
tens of thousands displaced by the violence.[7]

An Ambonese man named Alex Manuputty established the
Moluccan Sovereignty Front (Front Kedaulatan Maluku, FKM) in December 2000,
claiming the conflict could only be resolved if the Moluccas achieved
independence and endorsing the establishment of an independent Republic of the South Moluccas.[8]
Moluccas Governor Saleh Latuconsina officially banned the FKM in 2001.

Raising the RMS flag, especially on the April 25 anniversary
of the founding of the RMS in 1950, has become a major method of expressing
public disapproval of Indonesian rule and many Moluccan political prisoners
have been arrested following flag-raising ceremonies. But some of the harshest
penalties were meted out to a large group who unfurled RMS flags during the
June 29, 2007 celebration of National Family Day in Ambon attended by President
Yudhoyono and foreign dignitaries. Three of the political prisoners whose cases
are profiled below were among those involved in this incident.

Tim Advokasi Masyarakat Sipil Maluku (Tamasu), an
organization working to assist Moluccan prisoners, reports that there are
currently 70-75 individuals in prison for their involvement in the RMS cause.[9]
Human Rights Watch did not have access to all the charge sheets, verdicts, or other
legal papers and so cannot state definitively that all 70-75 are in prison for
exercising their right to peaceful expression of their views, but it is clear
from our interviews and press accounts that the vast majority fall into that
category. The prisoners include 21 of the 28 persons arrested for involvement
in the June 29, 2007 event as well as other activists involved in RMS
flag-raising and other forms of political expression.

The 2007 Flag Unfurling and Its Violent Aftermath

On June 29, 2007, during the National Family Day festivities
at Merdeka Stadium in Ambon, 28 Alifuru dancers entered the tightly controlled
stadium, danced the cakalele traditional war dance, and unfurled the
banned RMS flag. A school teacher, Johan Teterisa, led the dancers, who mostly
came from Aboru village, Haruku Island, east of Ambon. The incident publicly
embarrassed President Yudhoyono in front of his foreign guests, and when he
spoke after the dance he told the audience that there is “no
tolerance” in Indonesia for separatism.

Local officials reacted by immediately arresting a number of
the dancers[10]
and taking them to the counter-terrorism police Detachment 88/Anti-Terror
headquarters in Tantui, Ambon.[11]

Ambon police then launched a major crackdown against the RMS
and arrested about 100 alleged activists. Teterisa and Ferdinand Waas, the raja
(hereditary chief) of Hutumuri village in Ambon who aided and advised the
dancers, were prosecuted for treason and received long prison terms.

According to Teterisa, Detachment 88/Anti-Terror police
officers demanded that he sign a statement calling on the Moluccas Sovereignty
Front (Front Kedaulatan Maluku, FKM) to disband. The FKM is a banned
organization that promotes the creation of an independent RMS, and Teterisa is
an FKM board member in Aboru, Haruku Island.

He says that when he refused to sign the document, police
beat him almost continuously for at least 12 hours every day for 11 days.
Several beat him with iron rods and stones, and slashed him with a bayonet. On
June 30, 2007, four Detachment 88 officials beat him repeatedly with sticks and
outside the unit’s office, kicked and pushed him down to the nearby Ambon
sea, and continued beating him in the water. In another instance, officials
kicked Teterisa out of a second floor room and down a set of stairs. Teterista
told Human Rights Watch that his chest was crushed, a number of his ribs were
broken, and he was covered with black bruises.[12]

When the interrogators realized that torture was not working
to compel Teterisa to sign the letter, other officials came in and tried a
softer approach, saying if he signed the letter, the Ambon government would
provide some funding to increase fisheries in Teterisa’s home area of
Aboru. He refused. The officials then offered to guarantee that if Teterisa
cooperated, they would provide support for Teterisa’s three young sons to
finish their education up to the college level, but he again refused.

At 11 p.m. one night in July 2007, some officers brought him
to Merdeka Stadium to see the dancing site. He was handcuffed and walked there
at gun point. He told Human Rights Watch: “I kept on praying. I expected
to be slaughtered that night.” He said this was because “I have
refused their request. The Indonesian media in Ambon also put so much pressure
on me. I think they had only one option left: killing me.” The officers
never removed his handcuffs but Teterisa said that he was shown to a higher
ranking official who was not identified, and then taken back to detention.

Police arrested Moluccas activist Reimond Tuapattinaya on July 2, 2007. The police had previously raided a house that they suspected was being used
by the National Family Day dancers, and found a DVD showing Tuapattinaya
involved in a flag-raising ceremony in the Siwang area, outside of Ambon.
Members of the Detachment 88/Anti-Terror squad tortured him extensively for 14
days in their headquarters in Tantui, Ambon.

Tuapattinaya told Human Rights Watch, “We were
tortured worse than Jemaah Islamiyah [militant Islamist] activists. We were
stripped naked, only in our underwear, forced to sleep directly on the tile
floor. Early in the morning, we were ordered to crawl. We were kicked, beaten,
trampled. If they held an iron bar, we got the iron bar. If they held a wooden
bat, we got the wooden bat. If they held a wire cable, we got cabled. Shoes.
Bare hands. They used everything. The torture was conducted inside Tantui and
the Moluccan police headquarters. I was tortured for 14 days in Tantui, day and
night. They picked me up in the morning, and returned me, bleeding, to my cell in
the evening.”[13]

“One of them [involved in the torture] was the
detachment commander…. He’s not an Ambonese,” Tuapattinaya
told Human Rights Watch. “But most of the detachment interrogators were
Ambonese. They all wore civilian clothes.”[14]

Three brothers—Arens, Ruben, and Yohanis
Saiya—also took part in raising the RMS flags during the event on June 29, 2007. They were arrested and taken to Detachment 88 headquarters, where the
police beat all three of them with pieces of wood and iron bars, kicked them with
their boots, and banged their heads against walls. The Saiya brothers told
Human Rights Watch that intelligence officers in plain clothes served as their
interrogators.

Arens Saiya, the eldest of the three, suffered internal
bleeding in his intestine and urinary system, according to his medical records.
He said many of the interrogators were non-Ambonese officers, including the
commander. “I was tortured severely, more than a terrorist, when all I
did was dancing cakalele.” He said he received minimal medical
treatment when he was hospitalized in a Semarang hospital in March and May
2010. He continues to have difficulties urinating.[15]

Police at Detachment 88 beat Ruben Saiya so severely that
they broke his ribs and caused profuse bleeding from his head. He was denied
medical treatment for his injuries. Today, years after those beatings, Ruben
said he still suffers the effects: “I have headaches now. It is difficult
to sleep.” They also dragged him to the nearby coast of the Ambon sea and
repeatedly dunked him in the water—a form of torture similar to
“water-boarding.” Ruben told Human Rights Watch that as a result of
his questioning, he was basically “shattered, shattered.” He said,
“There are no more parts of my body that they had not beaten. We were beaten
and made to crawl on the asphalt with our chests.” He said he continues
to suffer the effects of his past torture, and often spits up blood in his
current imprisonment at Kembang Kuning prison on Nusa Kambangan Island. He is serving a 20-year prison sentence. Their youngest brother, Yohanis, was a
teenager when police arrested and tortured him. He is now held with Ruben at
Kembang Kuning prison.[16]

The authorities have also tortured other RMS
pro-independence activists involved in peaceful actions less high profile than
the actions at Merdeka Stadium on June 29, 2007. Often these actions involve
raising the RMS flag in public, especially on or around April 25th,
the anniversary of the proclamation of the RMS.

Leonard Hendriks, another RMS activist, said that he suffers
from constant headaches on the right side of his head and face. Hendriks said
the Indonesian police in Tantui beat him with their bare hands on the right
side of his head and burned him with cigarettes. He is currently in prison in Malang.[17]

Another RMS prisoner, Johny Sinay, says he sometimes
requires a wheelchair because of injuries suffered when police tortured him in
Tantui. In late 2009, he collapsed in his Malang prison cell as a result of
weakness in his legs which he attributes to the beatings he suffered to his
legs, thighs, and back. Sinai asked officials at Malang prison to allow a
medical specialist to evaluate his nervous system, but the request was denied.[18]

Police arrested Frejohn Saiya, now in Malang prison, after
he took part in a RMS flag-raising. He said police tortured him for six days at
the Detachment 88 headquarters in Tantui. At that time, he had long hair and he
told Human Rights Watch that interrogators grabbed his hair, repeatedly banged
his head against walls, and hit him with an iron rod. Police forced him to
sleep on bare prison floors in his underwear.[19]

Individual Case
Profiles

Johan Teterisa

Johan Teterisa, born 1961, was an elementary school teacher
in Aboru village, near Ambon, before he was imprisoned. He is a member of the
RMS and on April 3, 2008, was sentenced to life in prison for treason. His
purported crime was leading 27 other dancers holding RMS flags to protest
Indonesian rule on June 29, 2007, in front of President Susilo Bambang
Yudhoyono at Merdeka Stadium in Ambon. All of the dancers were immediately
arrested and taken to the police Detachment 88/Anti-Terror headquarters in
Tantui, Ambon, where they were subjected to torture.

State prosecutors charged Teterisa and more than 50 of his
colleagues with treason under articles 106 and 110 of the Indonesian Criminal Code.
An Ambon district court found him guilty and sentenced him to life
imprisonment. Teterisa says he was shocked when he heard the judges pronounce
the verdict of life imprisonment. Asmara Nababan, a former secretary-general of
the National Commission on Human Rights in Jakarta, said the Ambon judges had
failed to consider that Teterisa’s actions were non-violent. “The
judges should have deemed his action more as a political aspiration than a
life-threatening act,” Nababan told the media. “He only waved an
RMS flag, and did not carry a weapon.” The Ambon court also convicted 19
of the dancers of treason, sentencing them to between 10 and 20 years in
prison.[20]
On appeal, Teterisa’s sentence was reduced to 15 years.

The authorities also targeted his family. His wife, Martha
Leonora Sinay, was made a suspect by police who alleged that she knew about an
RMS meeting held in the Teterisas’ house in Aboru village. Sinay fled to
avoid arrest and hid in the jungle for seven months. Their three sons were
forced to go live with relatives.[21]
She has now returned and is able to live openly in the village.

On March 10, 2009, the Ambon government unexpectedly
transferred Teterisa and 36 other political prisoners, including those imprisoned
for the June 29, 2007 action as well as other pro-independent activities, from
Ambon to Central Java. From there they were transferred to Porong (seven
prisoners), Kediri (six prisoners), Semarang (six prisoners), and Malang (six prisoners including Teterisa himself). Twelve prisoners were sent to Nusa
Kambangan Island, located south of Java, with half sent to Permisan prison and
the other half to Kembang Kuning prison.

Teterisa told Human Rights Watch that imprisonment in Java
makes their lives much more miserable because it is now very difficult for the
prisoners to meet their families. Their families cannot afford traveling by air
to Java from Ambon, and transport by ferry and land transport is not practical
or feasible.[22]

“It’s almost impossible for my wife and my sons
to see their father in Malang. It’s too far. And my jail term is 15
years,” said Teterisa.

Reimond Tuapattinaya

Reimond Tuapattinaya, age 41, is an Ambonese who worked as a
construction supervisor in Dili, East Timor, from 1991 to 1999. Indonesian
police arrested Tuapattinaya on June 2, 2007, after they identified him as
participant at the April 25, 2006 RMS flag-raising ceremony in Ambon. Police
discovered a DVD film containing images of him at the event and submitted this
as evidence at his trial for treason under articles 106 and 110 of the Criminal
Code. The Ambon district court sentenced Tuapattinaya to seven years’
imprisonment. He was initially jailed in Ambon but then was transferred to Kediri prison, East Java, on March 11, 2009.

Tuapattinaya was born in Itawaka village on Saparua Island, off the southern Ambon coast, on January 1, 1969. His parents were farmers. After graduating from a technical school in 1990, he got a job as a
supervisor at a construction company in East Timor, then under Indonesian rule.

He was not involved in politics until the fall of President
Suharto. In January 1999, President B.J. Habibie, Suharto’s successor,
allowed the East Timorese to hold a referendum on independence or remaining an
autonomous part of Indonesia. Some East Timorese asked Tuapattinaya for advice
on how they should vote in August 1999. “Look at me,” he said he
told them. “The Moluccas, my home islands, are very rich but I have to
work here. We’re poor under the Indonesians. It’s better if you
vote for independence.”

When he returned to Ambon in July 2000, the area was
experiencing brutal sectarian violence between Muslims and Christians that
would claim thousands of lives between 1999 and 2005.[23]
Tuapattinaya believes authorities acted unfairly in handling the riots:
“Many soldiers were deployed to Ambon but why was Ambon still burned
down? Why did the Indonesian government permit Javanese militias to operate in Ambon? As a Moluccan, I began to think: who is doing right, who is doing wrong?”[24]

He began joining in prayers at Alex Manuputty’s
residence in the Kudamati area, a predominantly Christian neighborhood in
Ambon. When Manuputty, himself a Christian and a popular doctor, declared the
founding of the Moluccas Sovereignty Front (Front Kedaulatan Maluku, FKM) on
December 18, 2000, Tuapattinaya volunteered to help.

Indonesian police first arrested Tuapattinaya on April 25, 2 004, after a flag-raising ceremony in Ambon commemorating the 54th anniversary
of the RMS. The Ambon district court sentenced him to two years in prison for
treason. He was released a year early, on December 25, 2005, for good conduct.[25]

Tuapattinaya continued his political activism after being
released from prison until his re-arrest in June 2007. “For as long as
the Indonesian government cannot prove to me that the RMS is illegal, under
international law, I will not retreat. Injustice against the people of Moluccas continues. I have never backed away from my commitment. I never hurt
anyone.”

Now in Kediri prison, he shares a cell with five other RMS
activists.

Ruben Saiya

Ruben Saiya is a 27-year-old farmer who was born in Aboru
village, Haruku Island, near Ambon. He is now imprisoned in Kembang Kuning
prison on Nusa Kambangan Island, off Java’s southern shore. On June 29, 2007, he was one of the 28 dancers who unfurled RMS flags in front of President
Yudhoyono. He was arrested and an Ambon district court found him guilty of
treason under Criminal Code articles 106 and 110. He was sentenced to 20 years
in prison. His two brothers, Arens and Yohanis, also joined the dance protest
and they were sentenced for 8 and 17 years respectively and are serving their sentences
in Semarang and Kembang Kuning prisons.

Saiyo told Human Rights Watch that the Aboru villagers had
decided to dance in a bid to protest their suffering in their own islands.
“In the Moluccas, we cannot live a good life. We don’t get a good
education. We cannot find work. The Indonesian people have taken over our
islands,” he said.

When the Ambon court announced his sentence, his wife,
Johanna Teterisa, collapsed in the court room. “I don’t know what
to tell her anymore,” said Saiya. Because of the expense and logistical
obstacles his wife cannot travel to Java to visit her husband.[26]

Ferdinand Waas

Ferdinand Waas, born in 1948, was an Indonesian Army
officer, stationed in East Timor in the 1980s and 1990s. After his retirement
at the rank of captain, he joined the RMS. He allowed RMS activists to use his
house to plan the pro-independence dance at Merdeka Stadium in June 2007. He
was arrested and in October 2007, an Ambon district court found him guilty of
treason and sentenced him to ten years in prison.[27]

The Waas are the ruling raja family in Hutumuri
village, Ambon. His father, Dominggus Waas, replaced his grandfather as the
village raja. Ferdinand joined the Indonesian Army and served at the
Ambon-based 731st Infantry Battalion and later with the 733rd
Para Battalion.

In 1985, Ferdinand Waas served in East Timor in an Army
territorial command post in Manufahi regency. In 1992-1997, the army appointed
him to the Same town council in the Manufahi regency.

In 1999, he retired from the army and returned to his
village Hutumuri. The villagers asked him to be their raja and in 2005,
the Indonesian government officially inducted him as the Hutumuri village head.

At the planning meeting in Hutumuri on June 27, 2007, he
advised the Aboru dancers not to bring any metal equipment because such
equipment might create the impression that the dancers were planning violence.
“Their spears, their swords, were all made from wood,” he said. He
also advised the dancers on how to get identification cards to permit entrance
to the stadium.

He was arrested along with the dancers at the stadium and
detained at the Detachment 88/Anti-Terror in Tantui, Ambon. He said police
officers beat him with billiard sticks, pieces of wood, and iron bars.
“They knew I was an army captain, so I think they beat me harder, as if I
was younger,” he said.

Papuan Political
Prisoners

Background

The Indonesian provinces of Papua and West Papua (referred
to collectively here as “Papua”) occupy the western half of the island of New Guinea. Unlike the rest of Indonesia which gained independence in 1945, Papua
was under Dutch control until the 1960s.

On December 1, 1961, the Papuan Council, a representative
body sponsored by the Dutch colonial administration, declared that Papuan
people were ready to establish a sovereign state, and issued a new national
flag called the Morning Star.

Indonesia’s then president, Sukarno, had long
maintained that Papua should be part of Indonesia and accused the Dutch of
trying to create a “puppet state” on Indonesia’s doorstep. In
1962 he ordered Indonesian troops to invade Papua. The US government intervened diplomatically, and after negotiations, Indonesia and the Netherlands agreed to have the United Nations organize a referendum in Papua. The
UN-sponsored “Act of Free Choice” took place in 1969, in which only
1,054 Papuans, hand-picked by the Indonesian government, voted unanimously to
join Indonesia. Many Papuans consider the “Act of Free Choice” a
fraudulent justification for Indonesia’s annexation of Papua.[28]

Over the last five decades, support for independence, fueled
by resentment of Indonesian rule, loss of ancestral land to development
projects, and the influx of migrants from elsewhere in the country, has taken
the form of both an armed guerrilla movement, the Free Papua Movement
(Organisasi Papua Merdeka or OPM), and a diverse series of non-violent
organizations and initiatives. A common tactic of peaceful pro-independence
advocates has been to raise the Papuan Morning Star flag in public ceremonies,
particularly on the December 1 anniversary.

After Suharto’s resignation in 1998 the Indonesian
government for a time permitted the Morning Star flag to be flown on the
condition that it was raised alongside and placed in a lower position than the
Indonesian flag. President Wahid deemed the Morning Star flag to be a cultural
symbol. Efforts by Jakarta to address Papuan grievances also included granting
the region Special Autonomy status in 2001 which involves the devolution of
many political and fiscal powers to the province. The law also explicitly
allows for public display of symbols of Papuan identity such as flags and
songs. However, raising the Morning Star flag is prohibited by government
regulation 77/2007 and the Indonesian courts continue to treat the raising of
flags associated with pro-independence sentiment as treasonous and, as such, a
banned form of expression.[29]

Nazarudin Bunas, the head of the Ministry of Law and Human
Rights in Jayapura, Papua, reported that as of February 2010 there were 48
Papuan prisoners convicted of treason.[30]

Individual Case Profiles

Filep Karma

Filep Jacob Semuel Karma, age 51, has been in the Abepura
prison for five years. In May 2005, the Abepura district court found him guilty
of treason for organizing a pro-independence rally on December 1, 2004, and sentenced him to 15 years of imprisonment.[31] He is married with
two teenage daughters.

Karma was born in 1959 into an elite family in Papua. His
father, Andreas Karma, was a Dutch-educated civil servant who managed to retain
his position under Indonesian rule, and was appointed regent of Wamena in the
1970s and Serui in the 1980s. Filep’s cousin, Constant Karma, is a former
Papua deputy governor and now the head of Papua’s AIDS Eradication
Commission.

In the early 1970s, Karma often heard his father and uncle
talk quietly about the mistreatment of native Papuans under Indonesian rule,
which they told him were much worse than the abuses suffered by Papuans under
Dutch rule. While in junior high school, Karma wanted to get involved in the
Papuans’ struggle using political means rather than violence. In 1979, he
studied political science at the March 11 University in Solo, Central Java. He
graduated in 1987 and began work as a civil servant in Jayapura.

In 1997, he received a scholarship to take an 11-month
course at the Asian Institute of Management in Manila. When he returned to
Indonesia in 1998, he travelled in Java and learned about widespread student
protests against President Suharto.

On his return to Papua, Karma began to openly advocate for
Papua’s independence from Indonesia. On July 2, 1998, he helped organize a large pro-independence rally and raised the pro-independence Morning Star
flag on the water tower near the seaport in his hometown of Biak, Papua. A
violent clash ensued in which approximately a dozen police were wounded. On
July 6, the Indonesian military took control of Biak Island and opened fire on
the protesters. The full death toll remains unknown as many bodies reportedly
were loaded onto trucks and allegedly dumped in the sea from two Indonesian
navy ships.[32]
Biak residents claim they recovered numerous dead bodies on the seashore near
Biak.

Karma alleges that many bodies were buried locally on small
islands near Biak, and he personally estimates that more than 100 protesters
were killed. To Human Rights Watch’s knowledge, the government has
continuously failed to carry out a serious investigation of these incidents, or
hold accountable the perpetrators of abuses against the people in Biak. Without
an independent and impartial investigation to ensure accountability, the
memories of those killings will continue to inflame tensions and varied
death-toll estimates will continue to circulate.[33]

Karma was wounded on his legs by rubber bullets fired by the
military on July 6. The police arrested him and held him in detention from July
6 to October 3, 1998. On January 25, 1999, the Biak district court found him
guilty of treason for his leading role and the speeches he gave during the Biak protests and sentenced him to six-and-a-half years in jail. Karma appealed this
sentence, won his appeal, and was freed on November 20, 1999.

After his release, he joined the TPN-OPM Forum of Former
Political Detainees and Prisoners (Forum Mantan Tahanan dan Narapidana Politik TPN-OPM) whose objectives include helping Papuan prisoners and their families. Their chairman,
John Mambor, joined the Presidium Papua Council and headed the pillar group
within the council representing former political prisoners.

On November 10, 2001, members of the Indonesian special
forces (Kopassus) killed Papuan leader Theys Eluay, the chairman of the
Presidium Papua Council. This killing dramatically raised political tensions in
Papua. Three years later, Karma helped organize a ceremony on December 1, 2004,
to mark the anniversary of Papua’s independence from the Dutch. The event
was attended by hundreds of Papuan students, who shouted the word
“freedom!” and displayed the Morning Star flag. The chanting at the
rally also included calls to reject the Special Autonomy law as insufficient.[34]

When the protesters tried to raise the Morning Star flag,
Indonesian police attempted to forcibly disband the rally. Clashes broke out
and the crowd attacked the police with blocks of wood, rocks, and bottles. The
police responded by firing into the crowd. Karma was arrested immediately and
charged with treason, and has remained incarcerated ever since. On October 27, 2005, the Abepura district court sentenced him to 15 years’
imprisonment. His colleague, graduate student Yusak Pakage, was sentenced to ten
years in prison.

Today Filep Karma is probably one of Papua’s most
popular pro-independence leaders. He has never advocated violence as a means of
obtaining that goal. He said, “We want to engage in a dignified dialogue
with the Indonesian government, a dialogue between two peoples with dignity,
and dignity means we have no use of violence.”[35]

Karma says that authorities have denied him urgently needed
medical attention.[36]
In August 2009, he told friends that he had difficulties urinating. He
requested medical assistance from the staff of Abepura prison in Jayapura, and
prison director Anthonius Ayorbaba ordered that Karma be sent to the prison
clinic. Clinic staff examined him, and instructed Karma to just drink more
water and to take a rest. Finally, through the intervention of media and NGOs,
prison personnel were persuaded to send Karma to Dok Dua hospital on August 18, 2009.

The doctors at Dok Dua hospital examined Karma several times
between August and October 2009, and finally recommended Karma immediately be
sent for urology surgery, which they said could only be done in Jakarta.[37]
Karma made an official request to be sent for surgery in Jakarta. But prison
chief Ayorbaba told Karma’s family members that he is not authorized to
order such a transfer and added the Indonesian government lacked funds to send
Karma for treatment. Aryorbaba told family members to seek permission for the
transfer from Nazarudin Bunas, the head of the Ministry of Law and Human Rights
in Jayapura. But when they approached Bunas, he told Karma’s family to
ask Ayorbaba to write the letter and argued the government had no budget to
send Karma to Jakarta.[38]

Between December 2009 and February 2010, Karma, his family
members, and supporters negotiated with Indonesian officials for the medical
transfer. In March 2010, an NGO coalition called the Association
(“Solidarity”) of Papuan Human Rights Abuse Victims (Solidaritas
Korban Pelanggaran Ham Papua, SKPHP) ran a campaign to raise funds for Karma
and Pakage that raised enough money to send Karma to Jakarta. But then both the
Ministry of Law and Human Rights and Ayorbaba continued to refuse to proceed
with the permit.[39]
Karma told Human Rights Watch, “I used to be a bureaucrat myself. But I
have never experienced such [use of] a red tape on a sick man.”[40]

In early May 2010, following numerous complaints of human
rights abuses at Abepura prison, the government sent a new prison chief, Liberty
Sitinjak, to replace Ayorbaba as head of Abepura prison.[41] On
May 27, the Ministry of Health sent two Jakarta-based doctors to Abepura to
check Karma’s health situation and determined he could have urology
surgery in Makassar hospital. At this writing, the surgery has not yet been
performed.[42]

Buchtar Tabuni

Buchtar Tabuni, age 31, is a leader of the West Papua
National Committee, a pro-independence organization that has grown more radical
since his imprisonment.[43]

He was arrested on December 3, 2008, in his house in Sentani, near the Sentani airport, Jayapura, for organizing protests against the
shooting of his relative, Opinus Tabuni. He was sentenced to three years’
imprisonment under article 160 of the Criminal Code for inciting hatred against
the Indonesian government. Prosecutors also charged Tabuni with treason
(articles 106 and 110), but the judges acquitted him on those two charges while
sentencing him on the third.

Tabuni was born in 1979 in Papani, a small village 20
kilometers west of Wamena in the Central Highlands region of Papua. Indonesian
soldiers killed his uncle in 1977. In 1998, he went to college in Makassar,
South Sulawesi, to study engineering.

He became more politically active when a distant relative,
Opinus Tabuni, was killed by a stray bullet while taking part in a peaceful
rally celebrating United Nations Indigenous People’s Day on August 9,
2008, in Wamena. Many Indonesian police, intelligence, and military officers
were monitoring the rally when Opinus was struck and killed.

Buchtar Tabuni helped establish the West Papua National
Committee (Komite Nasional Papua Barat, KNPB) in Sentani. On October 16, 2008,
KNPB organized rallies in Papua and Java to welcome the establishment of the
International Parliamentarians for West Papua in London. On December 1, 2008,
KNPB organized a peaceful celebration of Papua’s independence in the
cemetery in Sentani where Theys Eluay’s is buried. Knowing about the
Indonesian government ban on raising the Morning Star flag, Buchtar Tabuni
worked with fellow activists to create many small Morning Star flags, too small
to be classified as a “flag” but large enough to wave visibly. Still,
two days later, the Indonesian police arrested him and an Indonesian court
subsequently sentenced him to three years’ imprisonment.

On February 26, 2009, Abepura prison officials discovered
that Tabuni had a mobile phone in his pocket. A prison guard hit Tabuni in his
eye, causing it to bleed. Prison guards then temporarily moved Tabuni to the
Jayapura police detention center, apparently so that Indonesia’s law and
human rights minister, Andi Mattalatta, would not see the wound when making a
planned inspection of the prison the next day. After Mattalatta left Papua,
guards returned Tabuni to Abepura prison.

On November 26, 2009, three soldiers, one policeman, and one
prison guard entered Tabuni’s cell in the Abepura prison. Tabuni told
Human Rights Watch that they attacked him without provocation, hitting his head
repeatedly, causing him to bleed profusely until other prisoners intervened and
stopped the attack. Prison chief Ayorbaba allegedly would not permit him to be
treated at a hospital. As news of the attack spread, Tabuni’s supporters
in Jayapura believed that the attack was part of a plan to murder Tabuni. So
that evening, his supporters surrounded the Abepura prison. They smashed
windows, while demanding that the police and military investigate the case and
calling for the Ministry of Law and Human Rights to punish prison chief
Ayorbaba for permitting the attack to occur.[44] Three TNI soldiers
and a policeman were publicly implicated and detained by authorities for
involvement in the attack, but the Indonesian government has yet to produce a
report on the attack or bring these persons to trial.[45]

On April 6, 2010, the Papuan office of the Indonesian
National Commission on Human Rights conducted an unannounced visit to the
Abepura prison and recommended the government transfer Ayorbaba without delay.
Juolens Ongge of Komnas HAM told the media that there had been more than 20
incidents of human rights violations at the prison since Ayorbaba took over the
prison management in August 2008. Ongge confirmed guards beat prisoners
frequently and found security in the prisons was poor and that many prisoners
had been able to escape.[46]
As noted above, Ayorbaba was replaced as prison head in early May 2010.

Ferdinand Pakage

Ferdinand Pakage, worked as a parking attendant in Abepura,
near the Cenderawasih University campus prior to his arrest. In 2006, police
accused him of stoning and stabbing a police officer to death during an
anti-Freeport protest near the Cenderawasih campus. An Abepura court sentenced
him to 15 years’ imprisonment under article 214 of the Criminal Code,
covering the killing of government officials.

On March 15, 2006, more than 1,000 students had staged a
protest demanding the closure of Freeport McMoran’s mining operation in
Papua. The students, organized under a group called the Street Parliament
(Parlemen Jalanan), blockaded the main street in front of the campus.[47]
Approximately 200 anti-riot police tried to end the blockade by firing teargas,
beating the protesters, and arresting a protest leader. The students reacted by
rioting and throwing stones at the police. Three police officers were brutally
killed, beaten to death by protesters. The dead included First Brig. Rahman Arizona, whom Pakage was accused of killing, and an Air Force intelligence officer.

Pakage, his parents, and his sister contend that he did not
participate in the riot and thus could not be responsible for the killing.
Pakage argues that the testimony of the prosecutors’ two main witnesses
against him—Pakage’s close friend Luis Gedi, a shop keeper, and
Alia Mustafa Samori, a police officer—was coerced or unreliable.

Police arrested both Gedi and Pakage on the day after the
riots, March 16, while walking near the site of the protests.[48] The
police allegedly beat Gedi and forced him to declare he was involved in killing
Brigadier Rahman. The police also allegedly pressed him to name another
suspect, and he ultimately named Pakage.[49]

At trial, the prosecutors brought seven witnesses but only
Gedi and Officer Samori testified in person that they had actually seen Pakage
stoning the victim. Five other witnesses, all police officers, provided written
testimony but claimed they did not see the stoning. Prosecutors also presented
as evidence the results of a blood test on a knife taken from Pakage’s
house days later and alleged to have been used to kill Rahman. Police claimed
the knife had traces of the blood of the victim.[50]

According to Pakage’s defense statement, he was also
tortured by more than two dozen police officers at the Jayapura police station.
He alleges that officers threw boiling water at him, and beat him until he bled
from his head, lips, legs, hands, and body. Pakage wrote that a Jayapura deputy
police chief shot him in the right leg on the night of his arrest, March 16,
around 11 p.m., after police under the deputy’s supervision could not
find a knife in the sewer outside the campus as Pakage had stated under
torture. He also alleges that a detective police chief threatened to kill him
with a pistol.[51]

On March 21, 2006, the police went to Pakage’s house
and seized his mother’s Kiwi 30-centimeter stainless steel kitchen knife
as well as his shirt printed with the number “15” and alleged the
knife was the murder weapon.[52]
The police also said he was seen wearing that shirt during the violence on
March 15. Ferdinand’s father, Petrus Pakage, told Human Rights Watch,
“It’s all fabricated. I signed the document and handed over the
shirt, the kitchen knife. But it was a knife to cut vegetables. His mother
always keeps it at home.”

Petrus Pakage added: “If you are shot in your leg, and
all the officers are all against you, beating you, like an animal, it is
difficult not to bow under pressure.”[53]

Both Gedi and Pakage are currently incarcerated at the
Abepura prison, where they both told Human Rights Watch they have again been
tortured. Pakage reported that on September 22, 2008, Abepura prison guards took him to the prison security office, where a prison security chief allegedly
struck him with a rubber club six times in the head. A guard then hit Pakage
with his bare hands, while the security chief repeatedly kicked Pakage with his
boot. Another guard allegedly punched Pakage’s head while clenching a
lock and key in his hand, and the protruding key penetrated Pakage’s
right eye.[54]

Guards allegedly threw the unconscious Pakage into an
isolation cell at around 8: 20 a.m. Another political prisoner, Selphius Bobii,
heard the noise of the beating and later saw Pakage inside the isolation cell.
Bobii demanded prison guards immediately take Pakage to hospital, but guards
did not send Pakage to the Abepura hospital until 2 p.m.[55]
Pakage says that the hospital was closed and he was not seen by doctors until
the next day, September 23, at Dok Dua hospital in Jayapura. By that time, it
was too late to save his right eye because the bleeding was too severe.

“My son suffered two times. First, he got a 15-year
imprisonment when there’re no witnesses, no evidence. Second, he lost his
eye,” said Petrus Pakage.

Abepura prison chief Anthonius Ayorbaba wrote a report on
the incident, calling it “an accident” that the guard, Herbert
Toam, hit Pakage without realizing that the key was still in the lock. The
report also claimed that Pakage had previously threatened a prison guard with a
dagger. The report does not mention the role of the other prison guards in the
attack.[56]

In December 2008, Ayorbaba told Human Rights Watch that the
report on the incident had been submitted to the Ministry of Law and Human
Rights as well as the National Commission on Human Rights (Komisi Nasional Hak
Asasi Manusia, or Komnas HAM), and added that the guard named in the report
would very likely be fired. Ayorbaba said he had advised the guard, Herbert
Toam, to take a leave of absence from work and settle the case through
traditional means, involving negotiations with Pakage’s clan.[57]
Toam did not go to work from October 2008 to March 2009 but continued to draw
his monthly salary. The Pakage clan and Toam did not reach any settlement of
the case. Toam returned to work at the prison in April 2009 and reportedly
continues to work there.[58]

Neither the Ministry of Law and Human Rights nor Komnas HAM
appears to have conducted any serious investigation into this matter. In
October 2007, Pakage’s family tried to report the case to the Jayapura
police, but the police refused to register and file the case. The family orally
lodged a complaint with the Ministry which received no response. In October
2007, the Office of Justice, Peace and Integrity of Creation, a church-based
NGO, wrote to the Ministry of Law and Human Rights office, complaining about
various cases of abuse, including Pakage’s case, but received no response
to their letter.[59]

Simon Tuturop and
Tadeus Weripang

Tadeus Weripang and Simon Tuturop are friends, both born in
Fakfak, Papua, in the 1950s. On July 3, 1982, they joined dozens of other
Papuans in raising the Morning Star flag in Jayapura, and were both arrested.
Weripang was sentenced to seven years’ imprisonment and Tuturop to ten
years.

Both served two years at Abepura prison and the remainder of
their terms at Kalisosok prison in Surabaya. When Weripang was freed in 1987,
he went back to Fakfak to work as a farmer. Tuturop, released in 1989, went to
Jakarta to help other political prisoners.

After President Suharto was forced to step down in May 1998,
Tuturop and Weripang rejoined the Papuan pro-independence movement. Tuturop
helped 100 Papuan leaders, representing Papua’s seven traditional areas,
to visit Jakarta and to have an audience with President B.J. Habibie in
February 2000, where they made a request for Papuan sovereignty. Habibie turned
them down.[60]

Today the two are both back in prison, imprisoned for
raising the Morning Star flag at the Pepera Building in Fakfak, West Papua province, on July 19, 2008. Pepera stands for “Penentuan Pendapat
Rakyat” or the Act of Free Choice, and it was in this building that many
Papuans believe Indonesian authorities manipulated the 1969 UN referendum.

Indonesian police arrested 69 people involved in the
flag-raising ceremony. Sixty were released and the remaining nine, including
Tuturop and Weripang, were tried. Tuturop says he personally was not tortured,
but that the police severely beat eight other detainees. “Maybe because I
am already 60 years old they have no feeling to torture an old man,” said
Tuturop.[61]

A criminal court found Tuturop and Weripang guilty of
treason under Criminal Code articles 106 and 110 and sentenced both to two
years in prison. After the prosecutor appealed the leniency of the sentence,
the Papua High Court increased their sentence to four years.

Roni Ruben Iba

Roni Ruben Iba is a hotel security guard in Manokwari, West Papua province. Police arrested him and about 35 others for raising a pro-independence
flag on January 1, 2009, outside the Bintuni Bay district government office.
They raised a flag that resembled, but was not the same as, the Morning Star
flag.[62]

At their trial, the defendants said they were mistreated
during the arrest and at the Bintuni Bay police station. They alleged that the
station police kicked them, beat them, and used a rifle butt to strike their
heads and bodies.

On November 12, 2009, a Manokwari district court convicted
Roni Ruben Iba and two of his clan members, Isak Iba and Piter Iba, for treason
under articles 106 and 110 of the Criminal Code. Roni Ruben Iba was sentenced
to three years in prison while the other two received two years each. They now
are imprisoned in Manokwari prison.

Indonesian Criminal Code

Book II.

Crimes.

Chapter I

Crimes against the security
of the State.

Article 104.

The attempt
undertaken with intent to deprive the President or Vice President of his life
or his liberty or to render him unfit to govern, shall be punished by capital
punishment or life imprisonment or a maximum impri­sonment of twenty years.

(…)

Article 110.

(1) The
conspiracy to [commit one] of the crimes described in articles 104-108 shall be
punished by a maximum imprisonment of six years. [64]

(2) The
same punishment shall apply to the person who with the intent to prepare or
facilitate one of the crimes described in articles 104 - 108:

First, tries to induce others to commit the crime, to cause
others to

commit or
participate in the commission of the crime, to facilitate the crime or to
provide opportunity, means or information relating thereto;

Second, tries to provide himself or others with the
opportunity, means or information for committing the crime;

Third, has in store objects of which he know that they are
designed for committing the crime;

Fourth, makes plans ready or is in possession of plans for
the execution of the crime intended to be made known to other person;

Fifth, tries to hinder, to obstruct or to defeat a measure
taken by the Government to prevent or to suppress the execution of the crime.

(3) The
objects referred to in the foregoing paragraph under 3rd-ly may be forfeited.

(4) Not
punishable shall be the person from whom it is evident that his intent is
merely aimed at the preparation or facilitation of political changes in the
general sense.

(5) If
in cases mentioned under section (1) and (2) of this article, the crime really
takes place, the punishment may be doubled.

(…)

Chapter V

Crimes against the public
order.

(…)

Article 160.

Any person
who incites in public [through speech or writing] to commit a punish­able
act, a violent action against the public authority or any other disobedience,
either to a statutory provision or to an official order issued under a
statutory provision, shall be punished by a maximum imprisonment of six years
or a maximum fine of three hundred Rupiahs.

Government
Regulation 77/2007 on Provincial Flag and Logo, Article 6A

The design of a provincial logo and a flag may not be similar
in essence with that of a banned organization, association, institution, or
separatist movement in the Unitary State of the Republic of Indonesia.
Punishments for violations shall be determined by ministerial decision.[65]

Acknowledgements

This report is based on Human Rights Watch research
conducted in Indonesia from December 2008 to May 2010. For security reasons,
the researcher cannot be named. Phil Robertson, deputy director of the Asia division;
Elaine Pearson, deputy director of the Asia division; and Joseph Saunders,
deputy director of the program office at Human Rights Watch, edited the report.
James Ross, legal and policy director at Human Rights Watch, provided legal
review.

Production assistance was provided by Diana Parker,
associate in the Asia division; Grace Choi, publications director; Fitzroy Hepkins,
production manager, and Anna Lopriore, photo editor, who assisted with the
photo feature.

Human Rights Watch would like to acknowledge the invaluable
assistance of a number of human rights organizations and defense lawyers based
in Papua, Ambon, and Java. We wish to thank the Jayapura-based organizations
Solidaritas Korban Pelanggaran HAM Papua and Garda Papua, the Merauke-based
Sekretariat Keadilan dan Perdamaian, and the Manokwari-based Institute of
Research, Analysis and Development for Legal Aid. In Ambon, we extend our
appreciation to Tim Advokasi Masyarakat Sipil Maluku (Tamasu). Human Rights
Watch also extends our great appreciation to a number of volunteers who
assisted our efforts to obtain data and photos from political prisoners inside
the prisons. We cannot name them because doing so could endanger them, but we
are deeply indebted for their help and acknowledge the personal risks they took
in assisting our research.

[3]
For another recent analysis of the Moluccan cases, see Amnesty International,
“Jailed for Waving a Flag: Prisoners of Conscience in Maluku,” AI
Index: ASA 21/008/2009, March 26, 2009, http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/ASA21/008/2009/en
(accessed May 31, 2010).

[6]
Johannesburg Principles on National Security, Freedom of Expression, and Access
to Information, (Johannesburg Principles), adopted in 1996,
E/CN.4/1996/39 (1996)http://www.article19.org/pdfs/standards/joburgprinciples.pdf
(accessed May 27, 2010). The Principles were drafted by international law and
global rights experts in 1995 and endorsed by the UN special rapporteurs on
freedom of expression and on the independence of judges and lawyers.

[8]
Reporters and commentators in some Indonesian media outlets called the
Christian protagonists in the sectarian conflict “RMS separatists”
without noting that some Muslim figures also helped establish the FKM. Republika
daily in Jakarta, Ambon Ekspres in Ambon, and Media Dakwah
magazine in Jakarta, for example, often used the term “Republik Serani
Maluku” which literally means “Moluccas Christian Republic.” In
Jakarta, two Moluccan Muslim leaders, Maur Karepessina and Jeki Zakaria,
participated in the FKM declaration on Dec. 20, 2000. In Europe, the FKM has a Muslim representative, Umar Santi. In the United States, another
Muslim, Hamin Sialana, represents the FKM.

[9]
Tamasu’s list of political prisoners is on file with Human Rights Watch.

[22]
For example, if the family of Teterisa wants to visit him in Malang prison they
must do the following. First, they need to take a boat from Haruku Island to Ambon Island. From Ambon, they then need to fly to Makassar and then Surabaya. From Surabaya, it is 90 minutes to Malang by car.

[28]
US President Barack Obama’s stepfather, Lolo Soetoro, was among the Indonesian
soldiers sent to invade Papua prior to the 1969 UN-supervised Act of Free
Choice. In his book Dreams From My Father, Obama describes how Soetoro was
changed—and traumatized—by what he had seen in Papua, including the
killing of Papuans. See Andreas Harsono, “Obama Has the Power to Help
Papua, the ‘Weak Man’ Under Indonesian Rule,” The Jakarta Globe, February 22, 2010.

[29]
“MRP Calling for the Release of Those Classified as Rebels,” http://www.manukoreri.net/west-papua-upheaval-media-briefings-and-background/mrp-calling-for-the-release-of-those-classified-as-rebels/
(accessed May 29, 2010).

[30]
Cyntia Warwe, “SKPHP Prihatin Filep Karma dan Tahanan Politik Di Papua,”
April 4, 2010, (describing her meeting with Bunas on February 16, 2010), http://www.facebook.com/home.php?ref=home#!/notes/cyntia-warwe/skphp-prihatin-filep-karma-dan-tahanan-politik-di-papua/407736255971
(accessed on April 9, 2010); Human Rights Watch interview with Cyntia Warwe,
May 27, 2010. However, as the report was going to press, another official in
Papua confidentially told Human Rights Watch that the actual figure of Papuan
political prisoners was 39. Human Rights Watch communication with government
official (identity withheld), May 31, 2010.

[33]
For a longer account of the incidents in Biak, see Lindsay Murdoch,
“Morning Star Massacre,” The Age, November 14, 1998, http://www.blythe.org/nytransfer-subs/98pac/West_Papua_Massacre
(accessed May 31, 2010).

[36]
There is a history of Indonesian officials denying medical care to Papuan
political prisoners. Tom Wanggai received a 20-year prison term for treason for
taking part in a pro-independence flag-raising ceremony on December 14, 1988. In 1995, while in the Cipinang high-security prison in Jakarta, Wanggai began to
complain about his health, but was not given timely medical assistance. He died
on March 12, 1996 in Kramat Jati police hospital in Jakarta. George J.
Aditjondro, “Mengenang Perjuangan Tom Wanggai: Dengan Bendera, atau
Apa?” Tabloid Jubi, Jayapura, March 20, 2000. A similar case is
that of Hardi Tsugumol, who was charged with providing logistical support to
Papuan fighters, was in the Indonesian national police headquarters’
detention center when in June 2006 he developed serious heart problems. His
medical treatment was delayed until late August 2006, when he finally was
permitted to have heart surgery. His lawyer said he repeatedly asked the Central Jakarta court to attend to Tsugumol’s health problems but only infrequent
follow-up visits by a doctor were permitted. Tsugumol died in December 2006. Eben
Kirksey and Andreas Harsono, “Criminal Collaborations? Antonius Wamang
and the Indonesian Military in Timika,” South East Asia Research,
vol. 16, no. 2 (July 2008), pp. 165–197.

[37]
In a letter dated October 5, 2009, Dr. Mauritz Okosera and Jhon Sambara,
respectively the head of patient transfers and the administration head of Dok Dua Hospital, wrote to PT Asuransi Kesehatan Indonesia, an insurance company, saying
that patient Filep Karma should be sent to PGI Cikini Hospital in Jakarta for urology surgery. On November 11, 2009, Dr. Donald Arronggear of Dok Dua
hospital detailed the results of Karma’s medical examinations, conducted
at the hospital from August to October 2009. Copies of the two letters are on
file with Human Rights Watch.

[43]
With the imprisonment of Tabuni, there have been leadership changes in the West
Papua National Committee, and some of the leaders have started to advocate the
use of violence. See International Crisis Group, “Radicalization and
Dialogue in Papua,” Asia Report no. 188, March 11, 2010, http://www.crisisgroup.org/en/regions/asia/south-east-asia/indonesia/188-radicalisation-and-dialogue-in-papua.aspx
(accessed May 28, 2010).

[58]
Ayorbaba contended that Pakage had run away from the prison and later tried to
rob a meat seller in Abepura. He said that Petrus Pakage, Ferdinand’s
father, admitted that Ferdinand had a dagger with him. Petrus also admitted
that his son had stayed at home for one month, a practice quite common in the
Abepura prison if one bribes a prison official. Human Rights Watch interview
with Petrus Pakage, Abepura, December 4, 2008. Rujinem Basuki, the butcher on Gerilyawan Street, Abepura, told Human Rights Watch that she remembered that a young Papuan
man matching Pakage’s description tried to sell a goat to her, but it was
a normal transaction, and he did not try to rob her or use any dagger, as
Ayorbaba had alleged. She questioned why Ayorbaba used her name in his report.
Human Rights Watch interview with Rujinem Basuki, Jayapura, December 7, 2008. No charges were ever filed against Pakage for the armed robbery attempt Ayurbaba
alleged.

[59]
On June 4, 2009, Human Rights Watch published a statement on abusive prison
guards in Abepura. It chronicled more than two dozen cases of beatings and
physical abuse since Ayorbaba, a Papuan civil servant who previously worked in
the Jayapura office of the Ministry of Law and Human Rights, became prison
warden in August 2008. Ayorbaba denied the findings of the report, admitting
only the beating of Pakage, and criticized Human Rights Watch. Cenderawasih
Pos, a local newspaper, was allegedly pressured into apologizing to
Ayorbaba for publishing the Human Rights Watch report and then retracted the
story. “Indonesia: Stop Prison Brutality in Papua,” Human Rights
Watch news release, June 4, 2009, http://www.hrw.org/en/news/2009/06/04/indonesia-stop-prison-brutality-papua.

[60]
Peter King, West Papua & Indonesia since Suharto: Independence, Autonomy or Chaos? (Sydney: University of New South Wales Press, 2004).

[62]
Some Papuans do not like the fact that the Morning Star flag colors are the
same as those of the Dutch flag: red, white, blue. They want to use a
red-and-black dominated flag. According to Tom Wanggai, red and black are
colors most Papuan think representing their land (red) and people (dark skin).
See: Aditjondro, “Mengenang Perjuangan Tom Wanggai: Dengan Bendera, atau
Apa?” Tabloid Jubi.

[64]
Article 104 covers attempts to incapacitate or kill the president or the vice
president and imposes a maximum penalty of death. Article 107 covers efforts to
topple the government with a maximum penalty of 15 years’ imprisonment.
Article 108 covers armed efforts to topple the government with maximum penalty
of life in prison. (Article 109 was repealed in 1930.)

[65]
An explanation in the Government Regulation explicitly says that Article 6a
refers to the logo and flag of the Free Aceh Movement, the Free Papua
Organization, and the Republic of the South Moluccas.